Ukraine must defeat Russia – any other outcome would be a failure for the West

Now, as we stare down the barrel of the war’s third anniversary next month, that seems a naive goal at best. What the world did see within days was columns of bogged-down vehicles, trucks and other heavy equipment abandoned for want of proper upkeep in the years leading to the invasion, and a Ukraine willing to bravely stand up to one of the largest militaries in the world.

However, for all that lack of success, Russia is still in the fight. It is exhausting its stocks of pre-war materiel, certainly – much of it older Soviet kit – but it is also continuing to ramp up its wartime economy to keep up with losses on the front lines. The collapse of the invasion – and even the possible ousting of Putin, as some observers predicted – has not come to pass.

Rather, Putin has shown a chilling willingness to throw his armed forces into bloody, attritional engagements for even the smallest of gains. And while the mercenary Wagner Group’s brief thunder run against its erstwhile employees in June 2023 suggested a hint of opposition against Putin’s war, the group’s owner, Yevgeny Prigozhin, and much of the group’s senior command cadre would be dead just months later.

The fallout from that led to the Wagner Group, and all other Russian private military contractors, being ordered to swear an oath of allegiance to Russia above all things.

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Putin, it seems, is going nowhere, and he remains committed to achieving his initial war aims – a complete conquest of Ukraine and the dismantling of its sovereignty. Sanctions haven’t stopped the Russian war machine, and if anything, they have driven Russia closer to other rogue nations, such as North Korea, which has already sent materiel and personnel to the front lines.

Invest in success

What every nation that has sent aid or materiel to Ukraine now needs to consider is not just how to continue supporting the embattled nation, but to what extent. Many citizens of the countries that have been most supportive of Ukraine are already beginning to feel fatigued over the conflict and amid a widespread cost-of-living crisis affecting many nations; it makes sense that many people would prefer to see a country’s treasure spent at home rather than abroad.

It’s similarly easy to look at continuing to send aid to Ukraine as something of a sunk-cost fallacy, that it’s no use throwing good money after bad. Yet, one of the reasons that the conflict has taken this long is that despite Ukraine’s stubborn resistance, it has never quite had the resources needed to win. Instead, it has had to deal with restrictions on how the long-ranged weapons it has been given can be employed while domestic political dramas saw US aid trickle to a standstill early in 2024.

In reality, what would be wasteful would be to slow down or stop aid to Ukraine. To abandon the nation now would make all the blood and treasure that has already been sacrificed to defend the country essentially a meaningless contribution.

What is needed now, more than ever, is a sober consideration of how the West can help Ukraine not just survive, but win – and not only on the battlefield. Russia must be forced to concede that the war is unwinnable and that even holding on to its annexed territory is impractical. Ukraine must also end the war with the resources to defend itself and expand its industrial and military capacity against any future threat. And Russia – and its leaders – must be made to realise that further hostility against Ukraine will be met with just as much determination.

It is not enough to win the war – the peace must also be won.

This will doubtless be a costly process, but the costs of failing to deliver the support Ukraine needs will lead to greater costs in the long run.

The cost of failure

A world in which Russia wins is an unstable one. The failure of the West to stand up to the new Russian imperialism will embolden many other authoritarian leaders – from China to North Korea, from South America to Africa, nations will look across their borders and realise that there is no better time to act on their expansionist urges than now, in the face of what could only be called a grand failure of democratic nations to stand up for one of their own.

But aside from that, Russia will inevitably take advantage of the rich resources of Ukraine to help improve and retool its own industrial base. Ukraine is rich in iron ore reserves and has some of the deepest coal seams in the world. It has significant deposits of titanium ore and bauxite and rich supplies of natural gas and petroleum.

That’s in addition to extensive heavy industries and a globally important agricultural sector.

All of that wealth would be within Russia’s sphere of influence, to be exploited as and how it wishes – and shared with whatever allies it wishes. It’s almost certain that North Korea would expect some share in the spoils of a vanquished Ukraine, particularly when it comes to feeding its starving population.

Changing goals

One of the greatest challenges facing Ukraine off the battlefield is the coming presidency of Donald J Trump.

Trump has been vocally against giving Ukraine any more leeway in its choice of targets beyond the Russian borders and has said that he can end the war on his first day in office – presumably by forcing Ukraine to give up its territorial claims in regions already annexed by Russia.

Trump is also unlikely to continue supplying aid to Ukraine if it does insist on fighting on. If the US pulls out of its support, the possible effect on other countries, whose burden would now be that much greater, is impossible to predict, but war weariness is certainly going to start to tell.

That was the thrust of a question asked of Minister for Defence Industry and Capability Delivery Pat Conroy this week during a press conference announcing that the government will be building 40 new Bushmaster Protected Mobility Vehicles. When asked if any more Bushmasters will be sent to Ukraine, Conroy said it was Australia’s “privilege” to be the largest non-NATO supporter of the country.

A follow-up question asked if the incoming Trump presidency would signal a “new calculus” on peace between Russia and Ukraine, to which Conroy spoke plainly.

“Our position is that we will support Ukraine to end this war on their terms. That’s our position and it will continue to be our position,” Conroy told reporters.

We can only hope the Australian government – and the world at large – stays that course.